


Calm After the Storm

by garbage_dono



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Childbirth, Domestic Fluff, Gen, M/M, Mpreg, Post-Canon, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2016-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-11 02:25:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8950129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/garbage_dono/pseuds/garbage_dono
Summary: Yuuri and Victor, newly bonded, prepare to become new parents.





	

**Author's Note:**

> ~~Oh god how did this get so long? WHY IS IT SO LONG?~~
> 
>  
> 
> Started as an experiment to see how I felt about writing mpreg in an omegaverse setting, and turned into a 10k word monster full of self-indulgent domestic fluff. Oh, and written in the span of two days. ~~I must be stopped~~
> 
> Thanks to n-s-f-w-sportsbaes and tomakehimfree on tumblr for getting me into this and encouraging me. They're the reasons mpreg went from one of my biggest squicks to...well, this. 
> 
> Don't ask me why I'm so enamored with the idea of Minako as a midwife in this setting. I was just as surprised as anyone else. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Also, who's here for ace Phichit? :D

_July 17 th, 2018 – 10:41 PM_

Yuuri had been pacing for the better part of twenty minutes – from the kitchen to the living room and back again, until Victor wondered if the carpet would ever be the same. Not that he particularly cared about the carpet, but the constant soft creaking of the floorboards was starting to give him a headache, and the growing furrow between Yuuri's brows wasn't helping him keep his overprotective instincts at bay.

“Are you sure you won't sit down?” he called from the sofa as he watched Yuuri make his way back and forth for what had to be the hundredth time. “Minako did say you should stay off of your feet.”

Yuuri shook his head, biting his lip as he pressed his hands against the small of his own back. “I can't sit down,” he said. “I can't get comfortable.”

Victor was up before he realized what he was doing, striding over to his mate. The feeling in his gut had become increasingly familiar over the past nine months – he'd never thought he could be so easily swayed by his own instincts, but then again, he'd never had a pregnant mate before. He held Yuuri close, stopping his pacing for the first time in nearly half an hour.

“Your date is just a week away,” he breathed, pressing a hand against Yuuri's heavily swollen belly. “Are you feeling alright? I could draw you a bath if that would help.”

That got Yuuri to laugh, and he covered Victor's hands with his own over his stomach. “Your alpha side is showing,” he chuckled. “It's just my back, Vitya. I'm nine months pregnant. I'm pretty sure a few aches and pains come with the territory.”

He sighed as he stretched backward, head craned up toward the ceiling and his eyes shut tight. Before Victor could say another word, he was back to his pacing, waddling back and forth between the kitchen and the living room with Makkachin close at his heels.

“You're _sure_ you don't want me to call Minako?”

“Yes, Victor.”

So Victor watched him as he continued to pace, slow and steady, into the kitchen and back to the living room, shuffling past the sofa every minute or so like clockwork. It felt like every bit of him was standing at attention, no matter how much he tried to relax – all he could focus on was the sound of Yuuri's movements through their house.

It was the change in scent that he noticed first. Yuuri's pregnancy pheromones had become so familiar that he barely smelled them now, even if they had peaked in intensity around the time he'd entered his third trimester. Something shifted, so suddenly that it almost made Victor start; the usual soft and welcoming scent that lingered whenever Yuuri left a room was replaced by something sharper, and even more intense.

That, combined with the fact that Yuuri had gone into the kitchen almost three minutes before and hadn't returned the living room, made Victor stand again, his book forgotten.

He found Yuuri in the kitchen, bent over the counter and holding himself up on his outstretched arms. He was leaning forward with his swollen belly hanging low under him and his hair spilling messily over his flushed face. His breathing was steady, but Victor could hear it even from across the room, coming in slow and deliberate sighs that hissed as they passed his teeth where they dug into his bottom lip.

“It's still just my back,” Yuuri said as he looked up and met Victor's eye, answering the question that Victor hadn't gotten the chance to ask yet. He let his head drop toward the counter again as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, swaying gently. “It's been killing me.”

“For how long?” Victor asked. Makkachin moved out from between them as he pressed a gentle hand to Yuuri's back. The muscles there were tense and unyielding, and Yuuri grimaced as another spasm came, pushing his hips back to try and stretch it away.

“Uh...a month or two?” he quipped with a weak little laugh. “But it started really bad last night. I could barely sleep. And it's only gotten worse since this morning.”

He caught Victor's eye again and sighed as he tried to straighten up. It didn't seem to do him much good – only made him gasp when the movement strained his aching back. Victor's hands flew to Yuuri's, reflexively, and he helped to lower him into a chair at the kitchen table.

It felt as thought his entire body was resonating, like some deep and primal part of him was guiding his movements as he lowered himself to his knees in front of his mate. That scent still lingered, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end and he wondered if Yuuri could notice it too. “Contractions?” he asked, and just saying the word made his heart leap.

Yuuri couldn't seem to sit still, rocking forward and back in the chair with a heavy crease between his brows. “I don't know,” he admitted. “I just can't get comfortable.”

Victor's expression mirrored Yuuri's, his lips pressing hard together as he straightened himself up. There was no mistaking the feeling in the pit of his stomach – this unshakable need to _protect_ his mate and child. It was almost like there was a magnetic force drawing them together, like Victor couldn't leave his side even if he tried. It was something he'd always felt in the back of his awareness ever since Yuuri had become pregnant, but it had only gotten stronger since then, and it had never been more intense than it was now. He almost ached with the force of it.

“The intensity of it can catch some people off-guard,” Minako had told him the week before, when she'd last come to check in on Yuuri's progress. “Particularly alphas. It's a two-way street, you know? Some people say you can feel what your mate is feeling. It goes beyond your normal everyday empathy – it's why some alphas go nuts when their mate is in labor.”

He'd tried to hide how uneasy the idea made him, with little success. “Anything I should do to avoid that?” he'd asked her.

She'd smiled at him, patted him on the shoulder and said, “Breathe through it.”

It had seemed like a joke at first, like was going to become some alpha-male cliché and faint in the delivery room. Now, though, he made a point to draw in a slow breath through his nose, if only to quell his own nerves.

“I'm calling Minako,” he insisted, and he reached into his pocket for his phone.

Yuuri pressed a hand against his wrist to stop him, struggling to his feet. “Victor, you don't have to. It's late and it's probably just a false alarm any-”

He wobbled on his feet for just a moment before Victor caught him and held him steady. Yuuri gasped a moment later, quickly followed by the unmistakable sound of liquid splashing onto the tile beneath their feet. They both looked down, and back up again to meet each others' eyes in an almost comical shared revelation.

Finally, Yuuri gulped, and managed to force out, “Call Minako.”

The phone call lasted all of thirty seconds; the moment she heard the words “Yuuri” and “labor,” she went from being annoyed about having to answer her phone when she'd just put her feet up to insisting she'd be at their house in ten minutes.

She got there in five, hair tied back in a messy bun and her jacket only half-zipped. “Where is he?” she asked the second she pushed past Victor into the hall, and he immediately saw her stiffen when she crossed the threshold. He wondered if the pheromones were really that strong that even a beta could smell them too.

“In the living room,” he told her, but she was already halfway there by the time he opened his mouth.

Yuuri had managed to settle himself on the sofa, on his knees with his stomach pressed against the back cushions. He rested his forehead on his crossed arms, propped up on the back of the couch. His shoulders rose and fell with every careful breath, his hips settling down on his heels as he relaxed. “Minako's here,” Victor called.

“Yeah, Minako's here,” she repeated as she made herself at home beside Yuuri on the couch with a grin. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“Sorry,” Yuuri managed with a small apologetic smile. “I thought it was just another false alarm...until my water broke all over the kitchen floor.”

“Sure sounds like go-time to me,” she chimed, and she turned to look at Victor. “Please tell me you've already cleaned that up.”

“I got it, I got it,” he insisted. “I wasn't just going to ignore it, after all-”

He stopped short when Yuuri let out a groan, half-muffled by his arm until he forced his breathing back into a steady rhythm again. His fingers curled against his sleeves. Victor was already kneeling next to the sofa, pressing a soothing hand to the small of Yuuri's back before he'd realized he was moving.

“I don't think I've ever seen you move that fast, Nikiforov,” Minako quipped. “Even in the rink. I told you a pair bond can do crazy things at times like these.” She turned her attention to Yuuri again, rubbing her hand up and down his back. “That's it...breathe through it, Yuuri. How far apart are they?”

Victor could only stare until she snapped her fingers in his face. “Hey, pay attention. You've been timing them like I asked?”

“What?”

“The contractions, Victor. How far apart are his contractions? When did they start?”

“I...don't exactly know,” Victor said, feeling a bit useless.

Minako frowned, but Yuuri spoke up before she got the chance to chastise him again. “I didn't think I was even having them,” he sighed, shoulders dropping as he relaxed against the back of the sofa again. “It wast just my back. It's been aching since last night, but I started having muscle spasms this morning.” He pressed his forehead against his arms, and Victor noticed for the first time that there was sweat gathering at his temples. “At least I _thought_ they were just muscle spasms. Now I'm not so sure.”

He moved his hand, placing it gingerly on top of his swollen belly. “That last one, though...that was different. A lot closer to what I always imagined they would feel like.”

He was chewing his lip, the way he always did when he got anxious, and Minako reached out to grab Victor by the wrist. “Hold your mate's hand already,” she said. “And you-” She pointed at Yuuri with a wide smile. “Don't you worry. I'm gonna take good care of you. Of course, there's still plenty of time to get to the hospital if you-”

“No.” Yuuri's reply was firm and immediate. “I'm staying here,” he said, and he gave Victor's hand a squeeze as he did. “I want to do this in my own house, with Victor. That's all I need.” His voice wavered, only slightly, but it was brimming with determination despite his obvious nerves. Victor only noticed then that his heart was nearly pounding its way out of his own chest.

He remembered Minako's advice from before, and took a few steadying breaths. He wasn't the one in labor after all.

“Alright then,” Minako said, reaching into her bag and pulling out a pair of latex gloves. “First thing's first – you need a thorough examination, and we need an idea of how far along we already are, so why don't we get that out of the way?”

The pink tint in Yuuri's cheeks was unmistakable, but he didn't put up any fight.

* * *

_July 18 th, 2018 – 3:27 AM_

Four hours later, and Yuuri was back to his pacing.

“Three centimeters,” he groaned as he pushed his hands against his lower back and stretched his chest toward the ceiling. “It feels like it's been forever, and I'm only dilated three lousy centimeters.”

“Omega males tend to have long labors,” Minako reminded him, sagely, tapping her fingernails against her trusty stopwatch. “At least early on. Your contractions are starting to get closer together though. Twenty minutes apart, now, so we're moving along.”

Yuuri's breath left him in one large gasp as he clutched his belly, and the second Victor reached him, he leaned his weight against Victor's chest.

“Eighteen,” Minako amended, glancing at her stopwatch again. “That's progress.”

Thirty-seven seconds later, by Minako's watch, Yuuri relaxed against Victor again, his face flushed and his breath slowing. “You should sit down, Yuuri,” Victor insisted. “Try to keep your strength up.”

“I guess I am gonna need it, huh?” Yuuri laughed quietly, and he put up little fight as he sank down on the sofa. “Maybe that stamina you always praise me for will come in handy.”

“It's come in _handy_ plenty of times before,” Victor reminded him with a playful smirk, dropping his voice low. “How do you think we got in this state in the first place?”

Minako choked. “Now is no time to be _flirting,_ ” she insisted, but Yuuri was laughing as Victor sat next to him on the sofa.

Yuuri grimaced as Victor handed him his water bottle again. “You need to drink,” he said. “I won't have you getting dehydrated now.”

“Are you my mate or my coach?” Yuuri asked with a tired little smile, but he obediently swallowed a few sips of water as Victor dabbed at his forehead with a soft cloth. He sighed as he leaned against Victor on the sofa, letting his eyes slide closed.

“Looks like you barely need me,” Minako whispered, laughing softly. “Let him get some sleep if he can.” She took the water bottle from Victor's hand and went to fill it at the tap in the kitchen. “We've still got time. You should catch some shut-eye too.”

Victor's eyes were a little heavy, and with Yuuri breathing steadily against his chest, he doubted he'd have anywhere else to go for at least a little while. But that scent was still lingering, sharp and almost spicy in a strange way, and it kept him from drifting off even when he tried to close his eyes.

“It's already getting to you, isn't it?”

He glanced over at Minako, who was draping a blanket carefully over him and Yuuri. “What?”

“An omega's pheromones go crazy during labor,” she said. “Some people say it's similar to what happens during a heat – it's like their body is reaching out for their mate for support.” She sighed. “Kind of poetic, in a way.”

He glanced down at Yuuri, who had managed to drift off to sleep nestled up against his chest. The familiar little flip in the pit of his stomach was still there, as it always was when he was near his mate, but it was accompanied by something deeper, something more primal. “I noticed it right around when his water broke,” he said, pushing the hair from Yuuri's forehead. “Like I was ready to do anything to help him, and nothing could pull me away.”

“Sounds about right,” Minako said with a little smile. “Alphas get especially _clingy_ when their mates are in labor.”

“Clingy?” Victor huffed.

“Well, any good mate will support their better half. But alphas...there's something about you. It's like you'll kill anyone who tries to get close. I've seen it before.” She put the filled water bottle on the coffee table next to them. “Just promise you won't try and bite me or something when things really get going.”

She patted him on the shoulder and made her way back to the armchair. “Seriously, try to get some rest. Even if those raging hormones of yours won't let you sleep, you'll need every bit of stamina you can get. We're in this for the long haul.”

Sleep proved elusive, but he managed to let his eyes slide closed and concentrate on Yuuri's breathing and the warmth of his body. It already felt like they'd been at it forever, but also like they'd barely started. Either way, they still had a long way to go.

* * *

_November 29 th, 2017_

It was a hell of a way to spend a birthday, curled over a toilet in a public bathroom stall while someone banged on the door from outside.

Phichit had been the one to convince him to come out to celebrate. He'd planned on a quiet night in with Victor, but with his mate trapped in St. Petersburg by a freak snowstorm for who knew how long, it had turned into a quiet night in their house alone. And according to his friend, that had just been too depressing to bear.

“I'm only in Hasetsu for a few weeks, so we have to make the most of it, right?” he'd insisted. “I'm not gonna let bonded life turn you into a boring shut-in.”

He hardly thought of himself as that, but he hadn't needed much convincing anyway. The thought of staying home alone on his birthday was hardly all that exciting. Now, though, curling up under the covers of his bed in the dark sounded less depressing and more tempting as his stomach heaved again and he brought up the rest of the dinner that Phichit had bought him.

“Yuuri!” Phichit called from the other side of the door. “Are you sick in there?”

There was hardly a point in lying when he'd definitely just heard him retching loud enough to make everyone else flee the bathroom. “Yeah...” he breathed, leaning his head against the cool edge of the toilet bowl. “I'm sorry.”

“Don't apologize, just let me in.” He fiddled with the door handle, but it was still locked. Yuuri sighed and reached up to open it for him. Phichit opened the door slowly, concern knitting his brows together as he tried – valiantly, albeit unsuccessfully – to pretend the smell of vomit didn't phase him.

“It's a little pathetic, don't you think?” Yuuri groaned.

“Was it the food?”

“No. You ate the same thing, and you're not sick, are you?”

“No...but you did eat those clams-” Yuuri gagged, but brought nothing up. “Sorry! Sorry...well, if it's not the food, are you sick? You know you didn't have to come out if you weren't feeling well. I could have just come and kept you company instead.”

“I felt fine when we left,” Yuuri sighed, and he hauled himself up on unsteady legs and flushed the toilet before sitting down on the edge of it with his head in his hands. “I don't know...maybe I was a little tired, but I figured it was just because I was worrying about Victor.”

“He's still stuck in Russia, huh?”

“Yeah, for the rest of the night, at least.” Phichit handed him a paper towel, and Yuuri took it, dabbing at his forehead. “I know he's fine, but he sounded miserable over the phone.”

“Of course he did. It's your first birthday since you guys were bonded, right? I bet he wanted to spend it together.”

Victor had said as much over the phone, sounding like he might just keel over from guilt and disappointment, no matter how many times Yuuri had assured him that they could celebrate together after he got home safe. “I did too,” he sighed, and he glanced pitifully up at Phichit as he balled up the paper towel in his hand. “Would you hate me if I asked you to take me home? I don't know if I'm up for much more celebration tonight.”

Phichit smiled at him. “Please, like I could hate you. C'mon – just as long as you think you can make it without puking again.”

He did, luckily enough. His stomach had settled by the time they stepped out into the cool night air. If anything, he was more disappointed that he'd wasted what had been a great birthday dinner, and they hadn't even made it to dessert.

Disappointment seemed to be the name of the game tonight, though. As much as he'd insisted to Victor that it didn't matter that he couldn't make it home that night – and as much as he had meant it – the thought of spending the evening without his mate made his chest ache. The bedding would smell like him, sure, but that was a poor substitute for the real thing.

Victor had been gone for nearly a week – Yuuri had been looking forward to welcoming him back home the way only he could, in the privacy of their own bedroom.

Since they'd become bonded that summer, it had become a completely different experience, making love to him. The closeness of it felt even _closer,_ but the opposite was also true. The absences were almost unbearable. When Victor was away for more than a day or two, Yuuri began to feel like he was in the midst of a heat, his body aching for him in a way that he'd never experienced before.

“It must be hard,” Phichit mused, hands hiding in his pockets as they made their way down the road. His breath puffed white in front of his lips with every word. “You know, being away from him for so long. I don't know what bonding feels like, but it seems like it would make it pretty awful, being separated.”

Yuuri shrugged, tempted to downplay the feeling of it, but with Phichit, he didn't feel such a need to hide the truth. “It doesn't feel quite right,” he said. “I can't really explain it. I miss him, but it's more than that.”

Phichit was quiet a moment, and then asked, “What does it feel like?” He laughed as soon as he'd finished the question. “I know it sounds dumb, but I want to know. Because I've missed people before, too, but never a mate. I've always kind of wondered how it's different.”

Yuuri pondered it as they walked in silence. It was hard to define, like trying to explain a color that someone had never seen before, or describing what an orgasm felt like. “You know when you sleep on your arm wrong?” he finally asked. “When you wake up and all you feel are pins and needles?”

“Yeah,” Phichit said, shuddering.

“It's kind of like that. You know your arm is there, and you know you _should_ be able to move it. You know what it should feel like, but when you try, there's just...nothing.”

It sounded ridiculous now that he was saying it out loud, but slowly, Phichit smiled. “I think I get it,” he said. “You know, that might be one of the better ways someone's described it. Better than people who just make it sound all mysterious by saying you can't understand it until you've felt it yourself.”

“Do you think you'd ever want to?” Yuuri asked him after a few moments of silence.

“I don't think so,” Phichit said, thoughtfully. “I mean, I've always been a beta. A little boring, I guess, but at least I don't have to deal with any of those heats or anything like that. But as for settling down with someone...I guess I just never really felt the need.”

Yuuri realized suddenly that they'd never spoken about it. He'd always wondered, but never asked. Now that he had, the answer made a lot of sense.

“Heats aren't all that bad once you get used to them,” he mused as they rounded the corner. “I mean, they can be annoying, but being in a pair bond makes it a little different.”

“I guess it does mean you get to have a lot of great sex, huh?” Phichit laughed, and Yuuri felt his cheeks flushed despite the fact that he wasn't far from the truth.

“It's not just that. It's all about...being close to someone. You know...intimacy and love and all that.”

As awkward as it felt saying it out loud, he knew there were few people besides Phichit that he'd ever manage to talk about it with. Maybe that was for the best.

It did make him miss Victor all that much more, though. He'd once thought of his heats as something to be managed, as a nuisance to be suppressed, but the ones he'd spent with Victor he'd started to look back on fondly. His last one had been just a few weeks before, and they'd spent it wrapped up in blankets and each other, their scents intermingling so completely that Yuuri could still smell traces of Victor's possessive and protective musk clinging to him.

He froze mid-step when the pieces started to come together in his head.

“Yuuri?” Phichit asked, looking back at him. “Are you okay? Are you gonna puke again?”

He didn't answer – he was too busy calculating dates, counting weeks.

“Yuuri...earth to Yuuri.” He blinked as Phichit waved a hand in front of his face. “What happened? You spaced out there for a second.” A sly grin stretched Phichit's lips as he wrapped an arm around Yuuri's shoulders. “Did you get caught up thinking of Victor?”

Oh god, now he really wasn't sure if he was going to throw up again or not. He glanced to his right, and by some cosmic joke – or maybe some kind of miracle – they'd stopped in front of a pharmacy. Without another word, he ducked inside, the door chime seeming to echo in his head, as muffled as Phichit's voice was as he chased after him.

Yuuri wandered the aisles, eyes scanning over the shelves, and finally, he stopped in front of the right section. He reached out and grabbed a box, staring at it until Phichit caught up with him. “What did you run in here for? Are you really sick after-”

He didn't have to look back – Yuuri already knew that Phichit had seen the pregnancy test in his hand.

“Oh,” breathed Phichit. “Guess it really wasn't the clams then.”

Yuuri wasn't sure whether he wanted to laugh, cry, or vomit. Instead of settling on one, he went to the bathroom in the back of the store and did all three.

* * *

_July 18 th, 2018 – 5:42 AM_

“Victor,” Yuuri forced out between carefully measured breaths, “I need to confess something to you.”

Victor's hands were resting on Yuuri's hips, guiding their gentle rocking as he breathed his way through another contraction in the middle of their bedroom. Two hours of work had yielded one centimeter of progress – nearly at the halfway mark – and conversation was getting progressively more difficult to carry on as the frequency of the pains increased. “Confess?” Victor asked. “What do you feel like you need to confess _now_ of all times?”

“It's Christophe's baby,” Yuuri deadpanned

“ _Hah._ What is it, really?”

Yuuri bit his lip and sighed as the contraction ended, and he let his head rest on Victor's shoulder. “You weren't the first person who knew I was pregnant,” he finally said.

Victor blinked down at him as Yuuri opened his eyes and met his gaze. “I wasn't?” Yuuri shook his head. “Then who-”

“Phichit,” Yuuri said with a little smile. “He was with me when I bought the test. He wasn't with me when I took it, but I'd just puked up the birthday dinner he'd bought me, and we both kind of already knew from the beginning.”

“I was in St. Petersburg,” Victor sighed.

“Yeah.” Yuuri reached up and cupped Victor's jaw in his hand. “It was a few weeks after we spent my heat together for the first time in our new house, remember?”

“Oh, моя любовь, of course I remember.”

“No _flirting,_ ” Minako insisted as she swept into the bedroom with a clean robe in hand and smacked Victor – just hard enough for him to notice – on the back of the head. “How are the contractions, Yuuri?”

“Still the same,” he said as Victor gently helped him sit down on the edge of the bed. “They're still almost ten minutes apart.” He sounded dejected. “My mother said Mari came quick, and I came even quicker. Why is this taking so long?”

“It's not all that unusual. I told you, omega males tend to have longer labors. Couldn't say why.” She sat beside him, pressing a hand to his back and offering a warm smile. “You're doing well, Yuuri,” she assured him. “Slow and steady is better than nothing. Trust me – you and your baby are both doing perfectly fine.”

She nodded toward Victor. “Even this one is doing a great job.”

Victor couldn't quite find it in him to be even close to offended. Rather the opposite – it felt much more like a compliment than anything else.

Yuuri tensed beside him, groaning as he fumbled for Victor's hand. Minako was saying something, reminding him to breathe through it, but her words sounded muffled and distant. All Victor could concentrate on was Yuuri's hand in his and his mate's face as it contorted in pain.

It made him ache deep in his gut – all he wanted to do was take that pain away, even just a bit of it. “That's it, Yuuri,” he hummed, reaching up to push the hair from his sweaty forehead. “You're doing so well, моя любовь. So amazingly well...”

Somewhere in the midst of the contraction, Yuuri had pulled Victor close so that their chests were almost flush together – as much as they could be with his swollen belly between them. He pressed his nose to the crook of Victor's neck, breathing in his scent and curling his fingers against Victor's shirt.

After it had ended, he relaxed with a groan. “So much for ten minutes.”

* * *

_November 30 th, 2017_

Positive.

A part of him had known before he'd even peed on the stick, but seeing it in front of him made his mind screech to a halt. His heartbeat pounded in his ears as he stared down at the test on the bathroom counter, one hand slowly covering his stomach. It was still flat – for now – but who knew how long that would last?

He swore he felt something flutter under his hand, but it was much too early for that. Just his imagination getting the best of him. Still, he let out a breath as he stared at himself in the mirror.

_Positive._

Pregnant – he was _pregnant._ Victor's child was growing inside of him, just a few inches under his hand where it rested on his belly. He watched his own reflection as he lifted his shirt, pressing his palm against the bare skin under his bellybutton and rubbing it in a slow and gentle circle.

He hadn't been able to sleep since getting back home. He'd told himself he would keep his promise to Phichit to try and get some rest, that he would wait and take the test in the morning. But their bed was so cold without Victor or Makkachin there, and no amount of Victor's sweatshirts could provide enough of his scent to make him feel like he wasn't trapped three-thousand kilometers away.

He'd finally hauled himself out of bed at two in the morning and peed on the damn stick, needing to see for sure.

The sound of the front door opening nearly made him drop the test right into the sink, and he scrambled out into the hallway and stood at the top of the stairs, staring down them as Victor dragged himself inside from the cold.

Makkachin saw him first, bounding up the steps and nearly tackling him to the ground, licking every inch of him that he could reach. Victor wasn't far behind, though, and the next thing he knew, his mate threw his arms around him, enveloping him in his comforting scent.

He could finally feel his arm again, and he sighed in relief.

“You weren't due back until tomorrow morning,” Yuuri mumbled into the crook of Victor's neck. He breathed in his scent deeply – the smell of it always managed to calm his thoughts and slow his racing heart.

“It _is_ tomorrow morning,” Victor quipped. “I caught the first flight I could get. I'd been away from you longer than I could stand already.”

Victor pulled away just enough to kiss him properly, and Yuuri sighed into it. “I'm sorry I missed your birthday.”

Instead of telling him what he'd already said a million times – that it was fine, that it couldn't be helped – he nodded quickly and tugged Victor closer for another kiss, deeper this time. He wasn't sure if it was the pregnancy hormones already running rampant, or the fact that his body was realizing just how long he'd gone without Victor's intoxicating scent, but he couldn't stand even the smallest distance between their bodies.

He needed more – he needed _skin._

He ran his hands underneath Victor's jacket, groping for any inch of bare flesh that he could find and finally sighing when his fingers found the line of his hip bone. He whined against Victor's mouth, going pliant and soft in his arms, desperate for his mate – his _alpha –_ to make him his again.

Makkachin whined when they shut him out of the bedroom, but they could make it up to him later.

They finally relaxed some time later on the tangled sheets, their combined scents mingling and warming Yuuri from the inside out with every slow breath. Victor's chest was flush with Yuuri's back, his fingers absently tracing soft patterns on Yuuri's bare shoulder as their legs bumped gently against each other in the dark.

“I thought you'd be asleep when I got back,” Victor muttered, kissing Yuuri's shoulder blade.

“I tried,” sighed Yuuri. “It's not easy, sleeping without you. And...”

There was that flutter again, deep in the pit of his stomach. Victor seemed to notice him tensing, and he pushed himself up to try and get a look at Yuuri's face. “Something wrong?”

“No,” Yuuri answered, and it was the truth. There was nothing wrong about it. In fact, it felt almost painfully _right._ “I just have something to tell you.”

Instead of saying anything else, he reached for Victor's wrist, guiding it over his hip and pressing Victor's palm against his belly. It was the same spot he'd laid his hand over before, in the bathroom, as he'd stared at himself in the mirror and tried to process the idea that there was a life growing in there – one that he and Victor had made together.

It took a moment of intense silence before Victor's breath left him all at once, and he sat up like a shot, staring down at Yuuri with his hand still pressed against his abdomen. “Are you?” he asked.

Not for the first time that night, Yuuri felt himself tearing up. He smiled as he nodded, his heart racing again. But this time, it wasn't from anxiety – this time, his heart was pounding in his chest because he was happier than he'd ever felt in his life.

And from the look on Victor's face, he wasn't the only one.

* * *

_July 18 th, 2018 – 7:17 AM_

The sun had risen at some point. None of them had noticed it.

They were past the halfway mark, finally, but there wasn't much time for celebration. Minako stood dutifully by the bed coaching Yuuri through another contraction as Victor held him steady on all fours, his knees spread on the mattress as his hips pushed back toward his heels.

He moaned long and loud through it. It wasn't a sound that Victor had never heard from him before – deep and ragged and almost feral. He rubbed Yuuri's back as the pain subsided and the sound dissolved into a few deep, shaky breaths.

A moment later, Yuuri was pulling away from him, shifting toward the edge of the bed. “I need to move,” he said. He was already hauling himself to his feet before either Victor or Minako could get out a single word.

“Let him,” Minako said, putting a hand on Victor's shoulder when he tried to reach for him, and she moved to Yuuri's side as he shuffled across the bedroom. “Easy, Yuuri,” she breathed, her voice uncharacteristically gentle. “You're more than halfway there now.”

“And the hardest part hasn't even started,” Yuuri groaned. He leaned against the door frame. “I'm already so tired...”

Victor wasn't sure what made him move, but he was already halfway across the room by the time Minako gestured for him. “Take off your shirt,” she said.

Victor blinked at her. “What?”

“Skin on skin,” she said. “It can help move things along sometimes with bonded pairs.”

Yuuri was pressing his forehead against the door frame, Minako holding him steady as he pushed his hips back and moaned out another contraction. Victor replaced Minako's hands on Yuuri's arm with his own, holding his mate close and feeling his body move and breathe through the pain.

They sat back down on the bed after it had passed, with Yuuri on his knees and Victor behind him, his bare chest flush against Yuuri's back. Yuuri's robe hung listlessly around his elbows, slipping more with every carefully calculated breath, but he hardly seemed to care.

“Vitya,” he sighed, letting his eyes slide closed. “Talk to me?”

“Hm?”

“Anything. I just want to hear your voice. You could read the phone book in Russian for all I care.” He pressed back against Victor's chest, searching for more contact, and Victor let his hands rest on Yuuri's stomach.

“You know,” he said, “When you first told me you were pregnant, the first thing I thought of was the beach.”

“Really?”

Victor nodded. “I thought about those seagulls, and how I'd grown up hearing their cries every morning. I never appreciated them like I should have. And I know it's silly, but I thought that our child would grow up hearing those seagull cries too, but he's going to grow up knowing just how precious they are.”

Yuuri drew in a shaky breath, and for a moment, Victor thought he was crying, but Yuuri was smiling as he craned his neck to look back at him. Laughter shook his shoulders against Victor's chest. “That's so cheesy,” he said.

“It is, isn't it?”

His eyes squeezed shut as another contraction hit, and he fumbled for Victor's hand for a moment before finding it. Victor helped him move through it, ignoring the pain shooting up from his hand as Yuuri squeezed like his life depended on it.

Victor watched as Yuuri mimicked Minako's careful breathing, and for the first time since Yuuri's labor had started, he realized that his own fear had faded somewhere along the way. He'd worried that he was going to be an absolutely useless wreck, that Minako would have to do all of the work while he panicked in a corner somewhere, but instead of winding him up, it felt as though his instincts were calming him. His body knew just how to move, just what to do to soothe his mate – he barely needed to think about it.

He wondered if Yuuri felt the same. The way he swayed and rocked with each contraction seemed much more like something ingrained in him rather than something he'd learned in any class.

“And here I was always taught that alphas were the stronger ones,” he mused as Yuuri finally relaxed against him, and he heard Minako laugh.

* * *

_January 30 th, 2018_

Victor's hands were warm around Yuuri's, a wide grin spreading across his face as he practically bounced on the balls of his feet. “Are you sure?” he asked. “Are you sure you're ready?”

“Three months,” Yuuri said, his hand wandering to his belly. Victor's joined it a moment later, eager and warm as he pressed against the tiny hint of a bump there. It seemed like Victor hadn't been able to keep his hands off of him since he'd started showing, always kissing and touching whenever he got the chance.

They'd agreed on three months, and waiting had been agony. Victor's eagerness had been contagious, making Yuuri want to tell every person he met that he was proudly carrying his mate's child. Now that he'd made it into his second trimester, both of them were practically vibrating at the thought of telling the world.

His parents had been the first to hear, less than an hour after they'd returned from his most recent check-up the day before. They had both cried, and so had he, while Mari had pretended that the tears gathering in her eyes weren't painfully obvious as she'd hugged him harder than he ever remembered her doing before. His heart had still been pounding by the time they'd left, tear tracks still visible on his face as he'd smiled the whole way home.

“Phichit is going to go crazy,” Yuuri laughed. “He's been asking how things are...it's been torture, not telling him.”

“I can only imagine what Chris will say.”

Yuuri's eyes went wide. “What about _Yurio?_ ” he breathed, and a moment after he and Victor looked at each other again, they both dissolved into laughter.

It faded as Victor pulled him close, fiddling with his phone. “You know....we don't have to do this,” he said. “If it's too public-”

“I'm married and bonded to a world famous figure skater,” Yuuri said, rubbing his belly. “And I can't hide this for much longer. People are going to figure out, so we might as well tell them ourselves.”

Victor's smile was wide and warm, lighting up his face until he looked like he couldn't have possibly been any happier. It made something flutter in his chest and belly, and even if he knew it was too early to feel anything moving quite yet, he swore their baby could tell just how excited both of them were to share its existence with the world.

Quite literally, when Yuuri considered just how many followers Victor really had.

“Alright then,” Victor breathed, and he pulled Yuuri close, holding his phone up to get both of them in the frame. “Say детка!”

It was a good picture – maybe even one worthy of being framed. The two of them sat perched on the edge of their bed, Victor's arm around Yuuri's waist as he grinned wildly up at the camera. Yuuri's smile was smaller, but just as warm, and he'd pulled up his shirt just enough to frame his growing baby bump with both hands.

Victor uploaded the picture with a smile and a flourish, and not five minutes later, Phichit was screeching down the phone at Yuuri while Victor doubled over in laughter in the doorway.

* * *

_July 18 th, 2018 – 9:01 AM_

Yuuri wasn't quiet – every breath left him on a long, low moan that seemed to rattle his entire body. That was for the best, according to Minako. “Helps your breathing,” she said, “And helps your body relax. So keep them coming, Yuuri. The louder the better.”

But several hours after sunrise, at almost nine o'clock on the dot, the sounds began to change. Yuuri was bent over the edge of the bed, hands pressed firmly against the mattress and his hips thrust out behind him, his hair clinging to his forehead as his fingers curled against the sheets. The sound that dragged its way from his throat was strained, shaking on its way out and leaving him panting and flushed.

“Vitya,” he breathed, his voice ragged, and he let his forehead rest on his forearms as his breath hitched. “I want Vitya...”

Something lurched in Victor's chest – empathy, protectiveness, or something else he couldn't name – and he held Yuuri closer. Minako handed him a cool cloth, and he pressed it to Yuuri's sweaty forehead, rubbing in soothing circles over his back. “I'm here, Yuuri,” he whispered. “I'm right here.”

Yuuri glanced over at him, his eyes red and his voice still rough. “Can you say it in Russian?” he asked with a pitiful little smile. “I always like hearing you talk to me in Russian.”

“Я здесь,” Victor said. His own smile slipped onto his face much more easily than he'd thought it would. He dabbed the cloth against Yuuri's sweaty temple, pushing the hair from his forehead. He pressed a gentle kiss there, sighing against Yuuri's skin. “Ah...your hair is a mess.”

“Sorry,” Yuuri muttered. “Been too busy trying to bring a new life into the world to keep up appearances.”

“I could help.” Victor smoothed his hand through Yuuri's damp hair. “If you like.”

As exhausted as his smile was, Yuuri nodded and pressed his forehead to Victor's. With Minako's help, they got him up onto the bed, where he settled on his knees with his hands on his thighs. Victor sat behind him, grabbing the comb from the bedside table and running his fingers through Yuuri's hair.

Yuuri melted under Victor's touch the way he always had when he did this, his eyes sliding closed and his shoulders relaxing. He hummed as Victor worked, the sound strained at first, but slowly softening into something quieter as Victor straightened all of the tangles and knots that had gathered there over the course of their ordeal.

They'd always done this the night before a competition, having found from the start that it calmed Yuuri's nerves better than nearly anything else. Over the months, the ritual had transformed into something more intimate, and though it had never carried a meaning that was ever overtly sexual, after their bonding ceremony, Yuuri had outright refused to let anyone else touch his hair besides Victor.

Victor had been more than content with that – he treasured the moments like this, and he was happy to have them all to himself.

The latest hum shook on its way out, Yuuri's hand reaching back for Victor's knee. “Another?” Minako asked, brow furrowing as she leaned in. Victor blinked – he'd almost forgotten she was there at all, he'd been so intent on comforting his own mate.

Yuuri nodded, biting his lip as his breath hissed between his teeth. Victor pressed his hand again Yuuri's, and Yuuri covered it with his own. He kept their fingers tightly entwined as Minako examined him after the contraction had ended, and giving them another squeeze when she looked up with a smile.

“Eight down,” she said. “Just two to go.”

* * *

_March 28 th, 2018_

Toward the end of his second trimester, sleeping had gotten more complicated. Comfortable positions were few and far between, and often involved lots of pillows in strategic positions between his legs or under his back. Victor was endlessly patient, never complained a single peep when Yuuri tossed and turned, and was always quick to offer the pillows on his side of the bed if they would help him get to sleep.

Tonight, though, Yuuri slept easy, with Victors legs tangled with his under the blankets and Makkachin tucked up against their ankles. It was nearly three in the morning when he jolted awake, eyes wide and his hands flying to his swollen belly.

Victor was wide awake a second later, like he could sense the way Yuuri's heart was leaping in his chest. His hand rested on Yuuri's hip. “Is something wrong?” he asked, voice urgent. “Are you alright, Yuuri? Is it the baby?”

Yuuri's brow furrowed as he moved his hands over the stretched skin of his stomach under his shirt, wondering if he'd imagined the feeling. Maybe it had been a dream. Then again, it was about the right time.

Then he felt it – that sudden shift inside his body, like something tumbling, pressing against him from the inside. He gasped, grinning as he grabbed Victor's hands and pressed them where his own had been. “It's happening,” he breathed. “Can you feel it?”

It took a moment, Victor's brow pinching in concentration as he waited, Yuuri's hands pressed over his own. Yuuri could see the very moment it happened, when another tiny movement under their hands made Victor's eyes go wider than Yuuri had ever seen them.

“Wow,” he breathed, the word barely more than a whisper, and he looked up to meet Yuuri's gaze. His eyes were gleaming, tears barely visible even in the darkness as his thumb gently rubbed over Yuuri's belly. “Did it just start?”

“I can barely feel it,” Yuuri mused. “Must still be so small even though I already feel like a planet.” He let his head fall back on the pillow, smiling tiredly up at the darkened ceiling. Victor leaned into his line of sight and kissed him softly, his hands still pressed insistently over his bump.

He was half-expecting some suave, saccharine remark from him, but Victor stayed quiet. He pressed his lips to the crook of Yuuri's neck, a move that made him sigh and melt against his mate.

“My baby,” Victor muttered against his skin, his hand rubbing tiny circles over Yuuri's stomach. “That's my child moving around in there...” He pulled back again, studying Yuuri's face. “It doesn't hurt, does it?”

“No,” Yuuri laughed. “Feels a little strange...but good, in a way.” He gasped and held his stomach again. “He doesn't seem like he wants to stop now that he's started. And I thought sleeping was already hard enough...”

Victor chuckled against Yuuri's jaw. “Maybe he's eager to get out. He does have two world champion figure skaters for fathers after all.”

The image of their baby being born in skates and spandex made him burst out laughing loudly enough to wake up Makkachin at the foot of their bed.

* * *

_July 18 th, 2018 – 10:17 AM_

By the time another hour had gone by, Victor was extremely thankful that they had no neighbors close by. It was no surprise that Yuuri had strong lungs, but what surprised Victor more than that was how much Yuuri tended to _curse_ when he was in enough pain.

It had been Minako who had started it – during a particularly powerful contraction, he'd spat out something in Japanese that Victor had barely managed to catch between breaths. It had made Minako's eyebrows arch in surprise, and she'd smiled a moment later. “That's it, Yuuri,” she'd encouraged. “More of that if it helps, as long as you keep breathing like you are.”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Yuuri cried a moment later. “Fuck, fuck, _fuck._ ”

It was halfway entertaining, despite the situation – Victor could count on one hand the number of times he'd heard Yuuri curse in earnest.

Things were starting to progress more quickly, and Yuuri couldn't seem to sit still. Victor had stationed himself behind Yuuri on the bed, his back propped against the headboard and his mate's head resting on his chest. “Never seen you curse so much,” Victor said when Yuuri had relaxed against him again, for as long as that would last.

“It feels like this is never going to end,” Yuuri groaned, pressing his hips down toward his heels like that could help relieve the pressure. “They just keep coming...it's like it never stops.”

“Just breathe, моя любовь,” Victor told him, and it seemed he'd stolen the words right out of Minako's mouth, minus the Russian term of endearment, at least. He rested his head on Yuuri's shoulder from behind, his hands tracing a gentle path up his mate's arms.

Yuuri reached up, pulling him close and tucking his nose into the crook of Victor's neck, breathing in deep until his breathing slowed again.

The relief didn't last long, and Yuuri moaned against Victor's neck, his fingers curling against the sheets. Something shifted in him, in the sounds reverberating through his chest and in the scent he gave off as he rolled his hips against the pain. Minako seemed to sense it too, and she leaned in closer.

“Yuuri,” she said, her voice soft, but firm. She waited until Yuuri could meet her eye again, his body relaxing back against Victor's chest as much as it could. “It's time.”

Victor's heart leaped, and he could see Yuuri swallow thickly. His eyes were wide and anxious, but it wasn't fear that Victor saw there – it wasn't so different from what he he'd seen gleaming there before a competition, restless and determined.

All Yuuri said as he sat up against Victor's chest and braced himself up on his mate's knees was, “ _Finally._ ”

It hardly felt real – it all seemed far away and dream-like as Yuuri gripped his hand and groaned insistently that he needed to _push._ His head was swimming from a neverending rush of hormones and exhaustion and _excitement,_ and all he could concentrate on was his mate – on the heat of Yuuri's flushed skin and the vibrations of his voice reverberating through his chest. Minako was saying something, but it was drowned out, distant and foggy, by Yuuri's long, low moan.

It happened there, in their own house, with sunlight streaming through the gap in the bedroom curtains. Minako coached him through every contraction, every push, with Victor feeling as though all he could do was hang on for dear life to Yuuri's hand, no matter how much the crushing pressure on it hurt. Between every one, it seemed, Yuuri would lean back to breathe in his scent, like it was the only thing helping him to catch his breath.

He cursed, and he groaned, and tears gathered in the corners of his eyes. Minako was firm, kept his breathing in check, encouraged him loudly enough that he could hear no matter how loudly he moaned. As exhausted as he was, he held tightly onto Victor's hand, pushing with everything he had left in him.

On the other side of the room, Victor watched as the clock ticked over to eleven o'clock sharp, and a moment later, Yuuri screamed, Minako cheered, and a baby began to cry.

* * *

_September 8 th, 2017_

The last box was finally inside, and the task of unpacking loomed ahead of them, but neither of them was all that keen on tackling it just yet.

As unseasonably warm as it was for September, it was a blessing that most of their bedding was still buried somewhere in their luggage. They made do that night with their new mattress and a spare set of sheets, too exhausted by the time they collapsed into it to do much more than lie facing each other as the moonlight streamed through the uncovered window. Makkachin had adjusted well to the move already, snoring contentedly at their feet from the moment he curled up on the sheets.

“Home at last,” Victor sighed, and Yuuri smiled as he reached out to clear the hair from his face. “I can't believe it took so long, and we've barely even started.”

“You're the one with all the stuff,” Yuuri chided. “How did you fit all of this in that apartment of yours?”

“Carefully.” Yuuri snorted and scooted closer to him, his eyes heavy, and Victor pulled him toward his chest and pressed a kiss to his brow.

They lay like that for a while, curled up against each other while Makkachin kicked at their heels in his sleep. It was all so perfect, so warm and welcoming, that Yuuri still wondered if he would wake up the next morning back in his old room. But he could smell Victor's scent enveloping him, reminding him of their bond and of the promises they'd made to each other, and he relaxed against his mate and let his eyes slide closed.

He didn't quite sleep, though. Not yet.

“Vitya,” he breathed.

“Hm?”

“Have you ever thought about wanting to have kids someday?”

That woke Victor up a bit more, and he took a thoughtful breath, letting his fingers trail down Yuuri's ribs. “Plenty of times,” he said. “You said you wanted them, да?”

Yuuri nodded. “I always figured I'd have them one day. Just didn't know when I'd have the chance.” He offered a shy little smile, and Victor matched it with a warmer one, cupping Yuuri's jaw in his palm.

“Well you certainly could now,” he said. “Well, not _now._ I figure we ought to get unpacked before we start thinking of growing our family.”

“Obviously,” Yuuri giggled. He covered Victor's hand with his own. “But...you think you'd want to? When the time came?”

“With you? I couldn't think of anything better.”

Yuuri grinned, brimming with happiness so completely that he thought it might start to overflow. He pressed his face against Victor's chest, letting his mate wrap his arms around his shoulders and hold him close. They could talk about it more in time, but now what they needed was sleep.

After a moment's pause, Victor breathed, “Just _think_ of the tiny skating costumes.”

His shoulders shook with laughter in Victor's grasp.

* * *

_July 18 th, 2018 – 12:30 PM_

Victor had never been more tired in his life, and had never wanted to put off sleep more. As heavy as his eyelids were, the last thing he wanted was to take his eyes off of the perfect little face surrounded by blankets in Yuuri's arms.

His mate was fast asleep, the baby resting on his chest. Victor snuggled up next to him, running his fingers through Yuuri's dark hair. It was dry now, albeit messy beyond managing with nothing but his hand. His expression was serene, his eyes lightly closed and his cheeks still a rosy pink, his breathing coming slow and steady through gently parted lips.

Their son had the same dark hair, as black as his father's and equally messy. His eyes, though, were so blue that it was like looking in a mirror. There was every possibility that they would darken with age, but Victor hoped quietly that they would stay as they were.

“You should sleep,” Minako, said as she padded quietly into the room. She stifled a yawn of her own, or at least tried valiantly to, as she stood beside the bed. She looked down at Yuuri warmly, a fond little smile tugging on her lips. “He's always been one of the strongest people I've ever met. On the ice, sure, but even more off of it.”

“Да,” Victor breathed, “I was thinking the same.”

She offered him a smile. “Yuuri picked a good one,” she said, stretching her back. “I think that baby will do alright with you two.”

“I'm trying to sleep,” Yuuri muttered, and when Victor and Minako glanced down at him, his eyes were still lightly closed, though his brow was starting to knit. Slowly, those eyes opened, meeting Victor's again as Yuuri managed a tiny smile.

Minako left them with a squeeze to Yuuri's hand and a pat on Victor's shoulder, slipping into the other room and closing the door behind her. Once they were alone, Yuuri tugged Victor closer, pressing his nose to Victor's shoulder and breathing in deep. “Why are you still awake?” he sighed. “You've been up as long as I have.”

“And you've been working much harder,” Victor reminded him, and he nodded toward their son, still dozing on Yuuri's chest. “This one has the right idea.”

Yuuri laughed quietly at that, reaching for their baby and running a couple of fingers – impossibly gentle – across the crown of their son's head. “He looks like you.”

“He has your hair.”

“He has your eyes.”

“Your nose.”

“Poor him.”

“Oh please,” Victor said, pressing a kiss to the tip of Yuuri's nose. “He's lucky.”

Yuuri didn't argue – his attention was focused on the baby, the same as Victor's. “It's funny,” he finally mused, quietly. “Ever since I got pregnant, I couldn't stop wondering if everything would go well. If he'd be born healthy, if we'd be good parents...I couldn't stop _thinking_ about it.”

It was hardly news to him – Yuuri had always had an overactive mind. Now, though, it seemed to have slowed for the better.

“I was happy,” Yuuri continued, his hand resting carefully over the baby's back. “I was so happy, and so excited. But I couldn't stop worrying, no matter how hard I tried. And I know it sounds ridiculous, but the second I saw this face...” He let his knuckle stroke over the baby's perfectly soft cheek. “I thought I would be terrified, but I've never felt so calm.”

It showed on his face, as clear as the smile that tugged on his lips and the rosy pink tint in his cheeks. “I can always just be terrified for the both of us,” Victor offered, and Yuuri snorted out a laugh.

“I have an idea,” Yuuri said. “While he's still sleeping.”

And so Victor moved from the bed just long enough to retrieve his phone from the living room. He sat next to Yuuri again, more conscious than ever before about how the bed dipped underneath him, and he snuggled up next to him, one arm settling around his mate's shoulders.

“So eager to tell the world?” Victor asked.

“More than eager,” Yuuri said with a nod, reaching up to let his fingers drag over Victor's jaw.

The picture was as perfect as it could be – both of them looking as exhausted and ecstatic as they felt, their baby sleeping soundly on Yuuri's chest. Their hair was messy, heavy bags under their eyes, and warm smiles stretching across both of their faces.

The phone rang off the hook for the better part of the rest of the day, but Yuuri and Victor – on Minako's stern orders – were too busy sleeping to answer.

 


End file.
